


A Proper Coven

by AJfanfic



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Dreamsharing, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Canon, Sort Of, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:08:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28295808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AJfanfic/pseuds/AJfanfic
Summary: Crowley is trapped in a dream world, Anathema leads him through it, and their knitting circle might have properly become a coven.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley & Anathema Device
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11
Collections: Podrama Team Christmas Exchange





	A Proper Coven

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tezca](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tezca/gifts).



> I sort of combined the prompts you gave me, I hope you like it! It's been a joy to work on this project with you :)
> 
> This story is born of a combination of influences, namely the strange dreams I've been having lately, TMA, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

“Crowley, love, are you up?” Aziraphale poked his head into their bedroom. “The coven is here, Helen brought those muffins you so enjoyed last time.”

The Coven was the rather tongue in cheek name their biweekly stitch-n-bitch had picked up after Anathema got dragged along by Madame Tracy, who joked they now had a majority of witches, Wicca, and otherwise supernatural individuals in the group. It had started as weekly tea with Helen, their elderly neighbor, who then started bringing around her grandchild, Revan. She didn’t ask outright, but as the only queer couple in the village, Crowley and Aziraphale had felt obligated to watch out for the kid. One of their visits coincided with Madame Tracy coming round, and before they knew it, the group was taking turns hosting regular get-togethers.

“Has he been sleeping all day?” Anathema called up the stairs.

“You know how the boy gets when it’s cold,” said Madame Tracy from the kitchen. “My joints sympathize.”

“Crowley?” Aziraphale perched on the edge of the bed. His partner was a lump under the covers, perfectly still. “My dear, if you don’t want to come down you don’t have to.” He brushed his hair back from his face, frowning at the lack of reaction. Aziraphale shook his shoulder lightly, then harder with Crowley didn’t so much as twitch.

“Crowley!”

“What’s wrong? Is he sick?” Anathema asked, coming up to join him. Helen had chased her away from the muffins until their hosts came down.

“He’s not waking up.” Aziraphale’s hands fluttered about in his concern. “I don’t know what’s wrong, we can’t get sick.”

She came around the bed and pressed her hand to Crowley’s forehead. “Hm. No fever, but there’s something off about his aura. Almost like there’s something covering it.” Anathema slid her fingers to rest against his temples. Her brow furrowed in concentration as she peered intently at him, seeing something Aziraphale could not. Anathema’s face went slack for a moment before she yanked her hands away, taking a step back for good measure.

“There’s something else here.”

“Whatever do you mean, dear girl? There’s something else in the room with us?” Aziraphale moved protectively closer to Crowley’s sleeping form.

“Sort of. It’s all twisted up with him.”

“How do I get it untwisted?” he asked, voice hard.

She shook her head. “I don’t think you can. It doesn’t feel like you two, it’s more like me. Old magic, but not divine, exactly. I might be able to get through it, but I’d need help. It’s way stronger than I am alone.”

“What can we do?” Madame Tracy asked from the door.

“Bring him downstairs, this will need some more space. And find some candles.”

Aziraphale carried Crowley downstairs, holding him close to his chest as Anathema rolled back the rug. She pulled a sharpie from her skirt pocket and drew a wide circle on the floor studded at even intervals with alternating circles and triangles, then tossed the pillows from the couch into the center.

“Lay him there.”

Aziraphale set Crowley down as gently as possible on the hard floor.

Madame Tracy bustled into the kitchen in search of candles, startling Helen and Revan who had been sitting by the kitchen table.

“Be a dear and help me with these, would you?” Madame Tracy asked, pointing to the top shelf where they were stored. Revan passed them down to her, confusion evident on their face.

“What’s up? Is Crowley coming down?”

“There’s been a spot of trouble, shouldn’t be anything to worry about.” Madame Tracy frowned. “Actually, it might be better if you both head out.”

“Nope, I need them,” Anathema called. “And the five tallest of the bunch please, bring them over here.”

Revan and Madame Tracy gathered the candles and the three came into the living room.

“Oh dear, what’s happened?” Helen cried, coming to kneel beside Aziraphale at Crowley’s side.

“Long story short: magic is real and it’s screwing with his head. I’m a witch, and you’re going to help me with a focusing circle.” Anathema turned to Revan, “You’re into Wicca, right?”

They nodded. “Yeah, I’ve always had an interest, but I-”

“Good,” she cut them off. “Set these up in the smaller triangles around him, then light them.” Anathema gestured. “Everyone pick a circle, sit however’s comfortable. I just need you still and within the lines. Don’t move until I tell you to.”

The circle took only a moment to arrange. Anathema settled cross-legged at Crowley’s head. Helen wasn’t exactly sure what she’d been expecting, but there was no chanting nor gust of wind. She simply closed her eyes and set her hands on her knees. She didn’t move for a long moment. Then, her mouth moved like she was shouting, screaming, but Helen heard no sound. She hoped that meant it was working.

  
  


Crowley was sitting in the Bently, and it was burning. He knew this. He’d lived this moment before. It would be fine. He reached through the spreading flames for the gearshift and flinched back as soon as his fingers brushed the leather. To touch the fire was holy agony, second only to the pain of the fall itself. Hellfire, it had to be, only that didn’t make sense. He was a demon, he should have been unaffected. He studied his blistered fingertips. 

These were not his hands. Too soft, too pudgy, too well-manicured. Crowley’s eyes sought out the rearview mirror to find Aziraphale’s face peering back, expression distorted with growing horror.

They’d switched corporations. They’d switched to protect each other but clearly, it didn’t work as they’d hoped. Somewhat hysterically, Crowley wondered if holy water would destroy him now too, if all they’d done was share their weaknesses and none of their strengths.

Someone was shouting from beyond the inferno, but the roar of the flames was too loud to hear them clearly.

Crowley grit his teeth. He tried the door handle, but the metal was worse than the leather had been. His palm blackened and he snatched his hand back, breathing heavily. Crowley felt sick with the pain, or maybe with the smoke inhalation. Flames licked up the sides of the seat and he bit back a cry. He would not scream for them.

_ The fire cannot hurt you! _

The voice was familiar, if wrong. Crowley struggled to place it through his haze. It didn’t seem right, for that voice to be wrong. He had the feeling that whoever was speaking was usually right.

_ Crowley! Please believe me, the fire cannot hurt you. You have to get out of the car! _

“I bloody know that! I’m open to suggestions!” he shouted. Crowley immediately regretted it, coughing on the smoke.

_ Aziraphale needs you right now, get out of the damned car! _

If he was still vulnerable to hellfire, maybe holy water would destroy Aziraphale after all. Crowley closed his eyes and threw himself against the door. The heat was excruciating, then suddenly, it was gone.

Stinging wind whipped his hair against his face. The distant sound of crashing waves and a faint taste of salt in the air told him “ocean” and for a moment, Crowley believed he’d fallen asleep on the beach by the cottage again. He opened his eyes.

The ground was black and rocky, dropping off a foot or so from where he knelt. Not the beach, then. He was on a cliff edge, some impossible to estimate distance above what must have been the ocean. High enough that he couldn’t see it, couldn’t feel the cold brush of mist against his sides.  _ One thing at a time.  _ Crowley looked down at his hands, which were, in fact, his hands again. He sighed in relief. Long strands of hair caught in his mouth, longer than it should have been by far. Crowley ran his hands over it, finding a nest of braids and beads that went halfway down his back.  _ Haven’t worn it this way since the Flood. _

Crowley stood quickly, swaying unsteadily. The flood. Serpent’s eyes were poor for distance, but he strained his gaze as far as he could. Beyond the drop, he found nothing but sea mist. He stepped back, robe snapping at his ankles, and had to pitch himself back to his knees or risk falling. A glance back confirmed his sinking suspicions. Not a cliff. A pillar of some sort, rising from an endless sea.

Crowley swallowed thickly a few times before he could speak. “Helpful voice? Still there?”

_ I’m here. _

“Any ideas?”

There was a moment of silence. He appreciated the consideration they were giving his predicament.

_ Jump. _

Crowley took back that charitable thought and mentally renamed the voice to Voice of Terrible Ideas That Will Get Me Killed.

“No.”

_ You have to jump. _

“I will drown, at least once, if not many times over, and let me say: I don’t have any interest in doing that again,” he snapped.

_ You’ve- Nevermind. Can you not fly? _

Crowley didn’t feel that deserved a response.

_ Of course.  _ Then fell silent for a moment, then said,  _ I was right about the fire. Trust me with this, else you’ll never get out of here. _

Crowley had drowned before, he’d survive doing it again.

He jumped.

He hit the floor with the force of tripping off a step. Crowley picked himself up, and found himself dressed in his own, current clothing, his hair restored to its proper length. He was in a hallway, lined with identical doors. The walls and floors were cement, lit somehow without any obvious light source. He couldn’t make out the end of the hall. It seemed to bend along a slight curve so he could only see the next few doors.

Crowley tried one at random. It opened onto an identical hall. As did the one beside it, and the next. With a sinking feeling, he opened two at once and peered through. The hall through both doors ought to have been the same by their positions, but each hall showed only one door open. Somehow, every door opened into different halls that somehow existed in the same space.

Crowley looked behind him. The hall curved away with no clear way to mark his position.

“What now?”

_ I’m not sure. One minute. Stay put. _

Crowley sat down. The voice had been right so far, and it wasn’t like the halls were going anywhere. Probably.

Anathema opened her eyes.

“What fear could a series of endless doorways represent?”

“Do you know who’s doing this?” Aziraphale asked.

“I think he’s in a dream, each scene is matched to something he’s afraid of. The first two were obvious enough to overcome, but I don’t understand this one.” Anathema looked around the circle.

“Endless doorways, you said?” Helen pursed her lips. “Could be a fear of getting lost, I suppose.”

“It’s this long gray hallway with doors along it that all go to other hallways. I feel like it’s more complicated than that.”

“It’s Crowley’s fear, right?” said Revan.

“I think so.”

“Maybe it’s about choice.”

Madame Tracy asked, “How so?”

“Well,” said Revan, slowly. “Doors could represent choices, and the fear is that they don’t make any difference. That your path is already set.”

The circle stared at them. Revan flushed. “I was very good at high school English.”

“They’re right.” Aziraphale nodded. “I’m sure of it.”

“Alright. We’ll try it.” Anathema closed her eyes and reached for the dream again.

_ I’m here. _

“And?”

_ You have to make the hallway listen to you. _

“That’s absurd.” Crowley stood, ready to pick a door at random and hope it would lead him out.

_ You’re dreaming. You can control it. _

“This doesn’t feel like a dream.”

_ I know. _

He crossed his arms. “Why didn’t you tell me that first, if it is a dream?”

The voice hesitated.  _ It’s not a normal dream. I’m not sure how much this affects real life and didn’t want you to take risks. _

“What, like jumping off a cliff?”

_ Pick a door and tell it to take you home. We’re waiting for you. _

“How am I supposed to do that?” Crowley turned to the door next to him and waved his arms around at it. “Take me home!” He looked up, which seemed as good a place as any to address the voice. “Think that worked?”

_ Do you think it worked? _

“I- I don’t.”

_ That’s the problem. Picture it. _

Crowley closed his eyes. The dark wood floors that he’d picked. The plush furniture Aziraphale loved. The olive green walls they’d compromised on, both warm and modern. There was a book on one end table, a wine glass set deliberately on the other, far away from easily stained pages.

He picked a door and walked through it.

Crowley opened his eyes to the living room of the cottage.

“What’s waiting for me this time?”

“Nothing. Some things, some sanctuaries, are still holy, whatever that might mean for you two.” The voice was hard to place, low and sweetly soothing. A hooded figure was seated on what had been an empty chair a moment before, their robes shifting around their form like sand.

“Dream,” said Crowley. “That’s my chair.”

“Good to see you again.”

“Thought we were on better terms than this.”

“We are. Unfortunately, I owed Michael a favor.” A ripple passed through Dream’s robes that might have been a shrug. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you made it through. I thought you might. Although I didn’t expect the witch. That was a clever trick you did.”

_ Thanks. _

“Can I go now? I’d like to get back to my real house if you don’t mind.”

“You’ve more than earned your way out.” Dream stood and bowed their head. “I’ll be seeing you.”

“No offense, but it might be some time before I sleep again.”

“None taken. Be well, Crowley, little witch.”

Crowley blinked and was staring up at the ceiling.

“Crowley!”

“Wait!”

He propped himself up at Aziraphale’s voice, looked around, and laughed. “Well, don’t you look a proper coven now?”

Anathema produced a bottle of hand sanitizer and poured it over the line of the circle, smudging it away. As soon as it was broken, the candles went out together and Aziraphale threw himself forward to pull Crowley into his arms.

“Are you alright, my love?”

“Quite. So sorry to worry you, angel.” Crowley wiggled himself onto Aziraphale’s lap properly and grinned at Anathema. “Thanks for that, little witch.”

“In return for saving you, don’t ever call me that again.”

“Fair enough, book girl. Do I smell muffins?”

Helen smiled. “You do, and I’ll offer them in exchange for a proper explanation now that I know you’re alright.”

“I suppose we do owe it to you both,” said Aziraphale. He helped Crowley to his feet and nodded towards the kitchen. “Well, in the beginning, there was a garden.”

**Author's Note:**

> Helen and Revan are recurring OCs in my South Downs setting, so keep an eye out for more of them!


End file.
